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Arrested For Shooting Down A Drone Hovering Over Your Own Yard?

A drone could hover a few above your lawn and you would have no legal right to do anything.

That’s because there is no clear doctrine on how far into the sky property rights extend. Instead, there are two conflicting and vague standards. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) contends that Uncle Sam controls all the airspace in the United States – even the space directly above your lawn — while common law infers that property owners have some rights to the air over their land.

“There is gray area in terms of how far your property rights extend,” Jeramie Scott, an attorney at the Electronic Privacy Information Center, a Washington think tank, told The Washington Post. “It’s going to need to be addressed sooner rather than later as drones are integrated into the national airspace.”

The issue is a significant one: About 700,000 drones were sold in America just last year.

William Merideth discovered the legal dilemma over drones the hard way when one flew over his home in Bullitt County, Kentucky, on July 26, 2015. Merideth called the sheriff but found there was nothing law enforcement could do, and so he blasted the drone with buckshot from his Beneli M1 Super 90 shotgun and knocked it out of the sky.